Speaker 1: Welcome to Before Breakfast, a production of iHeartRadio. Good Morning.
Speaker 1: This is Laura, Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast. Today's
Speaker 1: tip is that if you have personal priorities you want
Speaker 1: to fit into your life, don't wait until after work
Speaker 1: is done to do them. This is especially true if
Speaker 1: you work long hours. Doing these things early in the
Speaker 1: day is probably the way to go. I know lots
Speaker 1: of people listening to a show called Before Breakfast likely
Speaker 1: have elaborate morning routines. Sometimes we have these routines because
Speaker 1: we love our mornings. But I was reminded lately how
Speaker 1: if you work long hours, the mornings become truly important
Speaker 1: for feeling like you have a life. As part of
Speaker 1: my media interview talking about the time tracking study I
Speaker 1: did for Big Time, someone asked me about the so
Speaker 1: called nine to nine to six schedule that some tech
Speaker 1: and AI companies we're using. The idea is that you
Speaker 1: work nine to nine six days a week, with all
Speaker 1: those hours being about pushing fast toward your universe, bending
Speaker 1: work or something like that. You know what, I think
Speaker 1: this is a terrible idea. There are massively diminishing returns
Speaker 1: on extra hours over fifty or so. If people are
Speaker 1: at the office seventy two hours a week, they are
Speaker 1: rarely doing seventy two hours of quality work. So I
Speaker 1: made that point. However, it got me to thinking that
Speaker 1: if you are in a situation where you're needing to
Speaker 1: be at the office until nine pm, how you could
Speaker 1: still wrestle back some space for some things in your
Speaker 1: personal life. The key is that you have to use
Speaker 1: your mornings. Now, if you worked from let's say six
Speaker 1: am to six pm, you would probably use the hours
Speaker 1: from six to nine pm each evening to do personal things.
Speaker 1: If you need to be at the office during those times,
Speaker 1: because quitting time is more like nine pm, then you
Speaker 1: can flip this and do the personal things in these
Speaker 1: six to nine am window before work. Now, this requires
Speaker 1: a little creative thinking, and obviously not everything can be
Speaker 1: done early, but perhaps one could exercise, have family breakfast
Speaker 1: or meet a friend for breakfast, do a little reading
Speaker 1: or creative work, and then get to work around nine.
Speaker 1: In particular, if you happen to have this schedule, you
Speaker 1: would not want to wait until after work to try
Speaker 1: to do exercise, socialization, or creative work. You would just
Speaker 1: be too tired. I wouldn't have the energy after a
Speaker 1: twelve hour work day to make space for these things,
Speaker 1: they would need to happen first, even without extreme hours,
Speaker 1: I think there's wisdom to the idea of not waiting
Speaker 1: until after work. I have had some success with exercising
Speaker 1: in the evenings these days, but even so I have
Speaker 1: to talk myself into it. If you have a harder
Speaker 1: time talking yourself into it, then mornings are the way
Speaker 1: to go. I can do relaxed leisure time activities like
Speaker 1: puzzles and reading in the evening, but I almost never
Speaker 1: write in the evening. My creative stuff generally has to
Speaker 1: happen earlier in the day. If I am getting together
Speaker 1: with friends during the week, I am generally doing this
Speaker 1: as a walk in the mornings, because after work it
Speaker 1: will run into all the family stuff that has to
Speaker 1: happen wait until after work, and the odds that one
Speaker 1: person has to cancel because of something that came up
Speaker 1: go up a lot. Now, doing things in the morning
Speaker 1: requires some intention. It is easier just to think of
Speaker 1: the morning as time for getting ready for the day,
Speaker 1: but particularly if you do tend to start work more
Speaker 1: like at nine am versus earlier, there is a lot
Speaker 1: of space before that that can be used if you want.
Speaker 1: By using this time, you might increase the chances that
Speaker 1: the good stuff happens. Waiting until after work means all
Speaker 1: of that is less likely. So if you want personal
Speaker 1: time in your life and you do wind up working late,
Speaker 1: using the time before Breakfast can make you feel like,
Speaker 1: however many hours you are working, you do still have
Speaker 1: a life in the meantime. This is Laura. Thanks for listening,
Speaker 1: and here to making the most of our time. Thanks
Speaker 1: for listening to Before Breakfast. If you've got questions, ideas,
Speaker 1: or feedback, you can reach me at Laura at Laura
Speaker 1: vandercam dot com. Before Breakfast is a production of iHeartMedia.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from iHeartMedia, please visit the iHeartRadio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.